Building Brand Awareness for Rubina's Sauces

Business Strategy for Selling New Curry Sauces and Marinates

Sep 14, 2009 Marie Powell Mendenhall

Bringing a new food brand to market is a challenge that Rubina Surtie is meeting with gusto, for her new sauces and marinates.

Jars of Rubina’s brand sauces have arrived on store shelves, beginning in Western Canada. As president of Prairie Spicy Foods, Surtie has been working hard to get her new product onto store shelves in Western Canada.

Surtie was born in South Africa, and moved to Canada in 2001. She began her Saskatchewan-based business about three years ago. The development stage, from starting the business to getting the product into jars, took 18 months. Although she lives in Regina, Prairie Spicy maintains an address in Saskatoon where the product is bottled.

Using her childhood memories and family recipes for special Indian spices and flavors, she has developed a brand that recreates the most authentic taste in curry with her own unique flair.

Developing Curry Sauce With Natural Flavors and Ingredients

She spent about six months searching out distinctive ingredients, including a specific flavor of chili she remembered from childhood. “Curry is a combination of spices,” she points out. “It doesn’t mean just chili flakes.”

She wanted a product that was as natural as possible, without dyes, colorants, or oleoresins. “It’s very simple to bring out a product that costs half, or less than half, by using these additives,” she says. “So that was quite a learning curve.” She managed to overcome shelf stability issues, to extend the shelf life of her product, in a natural way instead.

As well as keeping the costs down by natural means, she studied nutritional tables to ensure the healthy quality of her sauces and marinates. “I need to be able to cook myself with it at home, and feel proud of it,” she says, “and know that I’m giving it to my family and they’re finding it good.”

Trade Show Cooking Demonstrations Help Build Brand Awareness

She says her biggest challenge is building brand awareness. “I think those that know of it buy it, but the challenge is trying to get more people to be aware of it.”

Her strategy to build brand awareness has included promotional materials such as a website, and seeking product development ideas from AgriValue Canada. She has given product demonstrations in various stories and trade shows. At the Grocery Innovations show in Toronto, for instance, she received favorable reviews and that helped her gain exposure. Her sauces and marinates are available in Sobey’s, Zellers, and the Bay in Regina.

“I’m a skeptical shopper," she says. "I don’t just walk into a supermarket and buy the first product I see. So it’s trying to get people to taste it, trying to get people to be comfortable with the product.”

Demonstrating her sauces in cooked meals featuring chicken, beef, and rice and vegetable dishes turns out to be one of the best strategies to build awareness. “People get to taste the product. We’ve had an amazing response to that.”

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Rubina's Sauces: Building Brand Awareness